17th fret prob on a vr100cr

RC88

i own a vintage vr100cr, which is a unbelivable budget guitar(normally €350 but i picked mine up for for €100 less than that:D) and has a great sound to boot
only prob is that the high e,b and g strings on the 17 fret seem to choke and don't play at all when i play them
but i noticed when i bend them above the d string area they don't choke The other 3(low E,a,d) play fine unless i bend them down below the d string area at which point they choke,
this only occors on the 17th fret and does'nt affect the other frets, the problem is only with the bottom half of the 17th fret but i don't know how to fix this problem, any help at all would be great, cheers

eoin5

At a guess I'd say part of a fret has lifted out of the neck. Usually happens when a neck dries out a bit. Have a look to see if the next fret after (18th I guess) is sitting fully in the wood or not.

Owen

If the guitar is particularly old, fret wear will be uneven throughout the neck. Chances are if its happening on the 17th fret, the strings are being choked by higher frets on those lower 3 strings which have hardly ever been played on up that high.

You're usually left with two choices, file down the offending frets - or refret the whole guitar and level the playing field for all frets on all strings.

RC88

yeah lads, asked my local shop owner what he thought,he said the same and he said he'd send it away to be refreted, seems my best option so i am gonna do that and maybe get a replacement while i'm at it, cheers for the info, any idea how much it would be to refret this type of guitar, or would it be cheaper to get a new neck glued on

wild turkey

A refret is usually about €10 a fret
sometimes by placing a flat piece of timber over the fret & giving it a very light tip of a tacking hammer it will solve the problem

IVRZ

Ya a refret is expensive enough. Up to 200e depending. You probably dont need an entire refret with just one fret giving probs. What id do is level the 18th fret which is probably too high. An entire fret level would even be cheaper than a refret. You can get the latter two options in dublin without postage costs.

RC88

right,i'll prob just get the damaged ones removed(noticed 18 is tarnished as well), cheers for the info

hairoil

I had this problem last year, same 2 frets, 17 & 18. It's fairly easy to fix yourself. Going on what you said, it seems the fret has started to rise out of the fingerboard, but as was said, frets and necks wear in different ways. Run a soldering iron 2 maybe 3 times down the lenght of the fret (only do one fret at a time). This will melt the glue, you can then gently pry out the fret. Carefully clean the fret slot and the tang, thats the bit of the fret that goes into the slot. Run a small bit of wood glue along the tang and replace it, tapping it down gently, put a little clamp on it till it dries, make sure to wipe away any glue that squeezes out and bingo!! You can also replace the fret with new fretwire if you can find the right gauge. Once you do this I would recomend leveling the frets, again, easy enough to do. Good luck!

RC88

hairoil wrote: »

I had this problem last year, same 2 frets, 17 & 18. It's fairly easy to fix yourself. Going on what you said, it seems the fret has started to rise out of the fingerboard, but as was said, frets and necks wear in different ways. Run a soldering iron 2 maybe 3 times down the lenght of the fret (only do one fret at a time). This will melt the glue, you can then gently pry out the fret. Carefully clean the fret slot and the tang, thats the bit of the fret that goes into the slot. Run a small bit of wood glue along the tang and replace it, tapping it down gently, put a little clamp on it till it dries, make sure to wipe away any glue that squeezes out and bingo!! You can also replace the fret with new fretwire if you can find the right gauge. Once you do this I would recomend leveling the frets, again, easy enough to do. Good luck!

tanx mate but took it to shop already, gonna be sent to get frets fix or replaced and prob get leveled, told it would cost bout 50 total so i went for it, given some of my own handiwork on it, prob better to get it professonaly done,tanx all the same

hairoil

No worries. Most stuff to do with fixing guitars is pretty straight forward, just need a bit of research and common sense. If you get the chance, there's a lot to be gained from getting a crappy guitar and trying things on it, change the frets, the pots, take it apart and just feck around with putting it back together. Hope the new fret job works out...:)

Dublin Guitar

A lot of fret problems, high frets or frets popping up are down to fretboards not being hydrated properly.

Regularly treating your fretboard with lem oil or fretboard hydrater is very important, once every few months I would recommend. It's like having a car and not taking it in for a service, things will eventually go wrong

Usually in these cases, a bit of lem oil and a fret hammer to the offending fret can help. Would not recommend you do it yourself unless you're confident you know how

All the best

DGC

RC88

yeah gonna have to stock up on lem oil soon enough(nearly out), just got the vr100 back, just tested it and have to say that for a few new frets, level and fresh strings, €45 well spent, would advise to someone who does not have any prior exp in fixing frets to get it professinaly done, trust me in the end worth the money